Repercussions
by somethingsdont
Summary: EC. Ten drabbles that can either stand alone or be presented together as a set. Post season 5.


i. **Knowledge**

Calleigh needs cocky.

You would be anything for her, but naturals trump imitations.

Professionalism is her priority. Share the lab or share a bed, not both. Your resignation letter is not written, not sealed, not sent. Another man sleeps beside her tonight, instead.

Her lips are not yours, Jake Berkeley will have you know, yet your cheek burns of their trace.

Their held hands grip history between fingertips. You clutch _her_story close to your heart, but her actions from lips to hips strip her words of meaning. She will not wait.

Jake's actions are deliberate, his smirk knowing.

He knows.

* * *

ii. **Business**

You wish Eric would ask, so you can tell him to mind his own business. His silent questions threaten to burst from his throat, but they nestle behind his Adam's apple, a fraction of an inch from his vocal chords.

He sticks to carefully measured phrases. His politeness irks you.

Amid the fingerprint matching and weapon identification, between the garage and the ballistics lab, you curse his existence. Your practiced lines stale in your mouth.

In the break room, you shove him, your palms on his chest.

"Don't you want to know why?"

He shrugs. "That's none of my business."

* * *

iii. **Memory**

"What you said was bullshit," you slur. You respect her too much to swear, but liquor loosens the tongue.

The look in Calleigh's eyes is unfamiliar; fear?

If she's scared, she hides it well. Hiding is Duquesne specialty, lamb chop.

"I don't even know how I feel about Jake yet," you rehash, mimicking her tone from that day, an awkward replica Southern accent playing on your lips.

She watches you drain your tumbler and ask for a refill.

She only speaks with the understanding that tomorrow, you will not remember a word of it.

"Sometimes, I wish it were you."

* * *

iv. **Toothing**

You followed Eric tonight. You needed confirmation of your suspicions without flat-out accusing him of gratuitous sex.

A seedy motel; a faceless woman.

You do not want to interrupt, because confrontation has never been your forte. You hold out on the naïve notion that he knows better than this.

He doesn't.

You see them through the cheap curtains; you hear their groans through an overactive imagination.

His hand is still working his zipper when his silhouette resurfaces.

You approach him and rest your fingertips on his arm, sticky with perspiration.

No surprise, only defeat. "I won't do this again, Cal."

* * *

v. **Clarity**

Playing house with three sisters has trained you in the art of make belief. Your five-year-old self grimaces when he is again assigned the role of family dog, but prides himself on being the _bestest_, most obedient dog Marisol, Isabel and Valencia have ever tossed a stick for; their praise becomes the educated pretender's version of a Master's degree.

Now, while trying to clear your mind of Calleigh, you straddle the thin line between healthy games of pretend and sickly practices of full-blown denial.

Clarity comes at a price; both feet must rest past the periphery of the rational side.

* * *

vi. **Perfection**

Jake treats you like a princess. A gun-toting, no-nonsense princess, but one nonetheless.

He does everything perfectly to rectify his past blunders. At night, he is exactly how you remember him: teasing you to initiate, riling you up until you threaten to blow his brains out, then handing you the reins. His body fidgeting impatiently under yours reminds you why you gave him a second chance.

Old familiarity eases your stiffened limbs.

Today, he kneels before you, a tiny velvet box pinched between his fingers.

The newly-engaged wonder when and where.

All you wonder is how you will tell Eric.

* * *

vii. **Invitation**

"I'm getting married."

An engagement band is wrapped securely around Calleigh's fourth finger. She toys with it and looks at you expectantly.

"Jake wants to have the wedding in Paris."

You fight the urge to vomit in her face. "Have fun."

She sighs. "It would be nice if you were happy for me."

You want to pronounce your congratulations, if only for her sake, but lies are difficult to tell through numbness.

"You're invited, anyway."

You laugh, loud and coarse; between the loss and the heartache, her words have never sounded more comical.

Denial is only possible without wedding vows.

* * *

viii. **Emerald**

Your baby has pale skin, dark curls and Daddy's cockiness in her eyes. She is a precious, seven-pound five-ounce bundle of joy, and she is all yours.

Yours and Jake's.

When Eric meets Samantha Ariana Berkeley-Duquesne for the first time, he rocks her gently in his arms, studying her face with a dangerous mixture of poorly-concealed jealousy and unadulterated astonishment. Still, you can tell she already grips his heartstrings in her tiny fists. She stares back at him with curiosity.

"She has beautiful eyes," he coos.

They glimmer emerald green.

Despite Jake's protests, you ask him to be Sam's godfather.

* * *

ix. **Encounter**

Your tongue fumbles for Calleigh's in the dark, but it has shoddy aim, so you splay desperate kisses anywhere your lips can reach.

She stops you gently but firmly, her palms pressing your cheekbones.

"I came to talk."

Your index traces five-pointed stars along her collar, your mouth still where it shouldn't be.

"I told Jake."

She has your immediate attention.

"We worked it out, but this—" Another rigid push. "—we can't anymore."

She leaves, the click of her heels diminishing steadily, unnervingly.

You had known from the beginning that 'just once' is never once and never just.

* * *

x. **Chances**

You get one chance to make a first impression, two chances to put your socks on outside-out and three chances to hit the ball out of the park.

How many did you and Eric let slip away? How many unspoken syllables, unfulfilled caresses, cowardly excuses?

Your familial trio – soon to be quartet; pat on your abdomen – is flawless. Eric's girlfriend visits the lab occasionally.

Too late. Too late from day one. Too late is what it'll always be.

An alternate beginning or a braver course may have led to a different outcome, but maybe not.

Because you, you need cocky.


End file.
